Jeffrey D. Sadow is an associate professor of political science at Louisiana State University Shreveport. If you're an elected official, political operative or anyone else upset at his views, don't go bothering LSUS or LSU System officials about that because these are his own views solely.
This publishes Sunday through Thursday with the exception of 7 holidays. Also check out his Louisiana Legislature Log especially during legislative sessions (in "Louisiana Politics Blog Roll" below).

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26.11.13

Bad poll news for Landrieu, good for Vitter continues

A
poll
about the fortunes of Louisiana U.S. Senate candidates next year and
gubernatorial candidates the year after provided excellent news for Republicans
in federal office and highlighted the continually deteriorating position of
Democrats in the state.

Among
other things, the recent survey by Southern Media and Opinion Research looked
at answers for likely voters for the offices of senator and governor. For the
Senate seat currently held by Sen. Mary
Landrieu, she led U.S. Rep. Bill Cassidy
41-34 percent, with another Republican challenger recent state arrival Rob Maness at 10 percent.

Ever
since Cassidy formally announced his candidacy and data like this from time to
time would surface, this space
has pointed out the problematic chances of Landrieu’s reelection even as
other analysts continued to imagine strength in her bid not reflective of the
actual data. Not so this data, which not only showed she would lose a general
election runoff to Cassidy, but also contained information that of the
representative sample less than half approved of her job performance, over half
said someone new should be elected, a large majority of the undecided and those
who would not reveal a choice would vote against a candidate who favored the
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”) that she favors, and
that as its members discovered more about Cassidy, who unlike Landrieu has much
lower name recognition, his approval ratings improved. Perhaps these results finally
should disabuse anybody of the notion that Landrieu is favored in any way in
the contest. In fact, it’s now questionable that she isn’t a distinct underdog.

Of
course, a dispassionate review of the environment should have alerted any
perspicacious analyst of this. It was clear
long ago that revelations of the internal contradictions of Obamacare in
action would damage her and that she faced unfavorable dynamics from the start.
Still almost a year away from the actual vote where anything can happen in the
interim, the political history has an unpleasant lesson for her partisans:
incumbents with this profile simply do not win reelection.

Nor
does the news for Democrats get better with hypothetical fields for the governor’s
race. The only announced candidate for the job, state Rep. John Bel Edwards,
is one and shows he nearly drags the rear with just 8 percent of the very early
vote. Topping it was Sen. David
Vitter at 30 percent followed by Treasurer John
Kennedy at 19 percent and Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne at
18 percent. Actually dragging the rear is Public Service Commissioner Scott Angelle at 2 percent.

Of
course, with this about two years out from decision a third of the electorate
remains undecided, a significant portion of the electorate is not aware of some
candidates, especially concerning Angelle and Edwards, and support for some
probably is soft. Regardless, at this juncture, Vitter clearly holds the
advantage should he become a candidate.

Not
only does he have the early lead, but his demographic reach is impressive.
Already over half of Republicans say he is their choice (Dardenne is next
almost 30 points behind), but also over 18 percent of Democrats (just behind
Kennedy for the most) and, most intriguingly, almost 15 percent of blacks (with
Kennedy only ahead of him, by almost 10 percentage points) tab him as their choice
as well.

As
more information comes out about candidates, the advantage he has among
Republicans is not likely to erode much, if at all. And given that he already
is well known, as long as a black candidate doesn’t enter the race (none are
foreseen), current black and Democrat support for him should diminish little,
if at all. Any candidate that starts from these base numbers would be almost impossible
to defeat.

And
it doesn’t look as if there’s much room for support to grow for the other
candidates. Among Vitter, Kennedy, and Dardenne, they all have roughly similar
approval ratings at around 60 percent. And if another white Democrat were to
enter the race, as a result of this Kennedy and Dardenne are the two most
likely to lose Democrats’ support given their perceived populist (Kennedy) and
moderate (Dardenne) postures as candidates.

Still,
the inability of Edwards to have much traction at all in a state where the
plurality of registered voters are Democrats may be matched by disappointment
in Angelle’s showing, where rumors of his candidacy may come from a desire by
elements loyal to Gov. Bobby
Jindal to get a guy in the running. There’s no considered principled
conservative in the race other than Vitter, but the thought that Angelle may
fill that role perhaps has foundered on some recent
questionable decisions he has made on the PSC from a conservative
perspective.

If Vitter hesitates from entering the derby only
because he waits on a positive sign about his chances, after these numbers he
has no remaining excuse to wait. And Democrats are on notice that their chances
at the state’s highest office are more fleeting than ever.

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